Ye wei = a recent Chinese fad where exotic items are consumed with no regard for their rare, precious quality or the detrimental effect on the environment.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Radiohead breaks another model and so does.... Paul Westerberg?

You've probably already heard about Radiohead's fascinating new video that was done with out cameras or lighting (just data rendering) but maybe you didn't know that they took the extra step of making the code for it open source, which means that anyone can play around with it and as this Slashdot story details, that's already started happening.

And how about this for another tech head-turner. Paul Westerberg just posted an album on Amazon for 49 cents and though it's called 49:00, technically it's 43 minutes long. Still for less than half a buck, you get some two dozen untitled songs strung together as a huge collage/grab-bag, including PW's wacky radio mix. Along with other artists who are putting out albums with little or no notice as a big surprise, this is a pretty nice idea and who's gonna complain about the price, even if it is some rough sketches and home demos, which still carry his endearing sense of song and melody (though a few 'songs' clock in at less than a half-minute and less which should please Napalm Death fans). Expect other artists to follow suit...

There's some interesting details about the Westerberg album and how it came about from this Billboard article.